U.S. patent application number 10/767242 was filed with the patent office on 2004-09-23 for systems and methods for selecting advertisements to be provided to users via a communication network.
Invention is credited to Dallara, Keith M., Hansen, Christopher J., Margiloff, William A..
Application Number | 20040186778 10/767242 |
Document ID | / |
Family ID | 32996362 |
Filed Date | 2004-09-23 |
United States Patent
Application |
20040186778 |
Kind Code |
A1 |
Margiloff, William A. ; et
al. |
September 23, 2004 |
Systems and methods for selecting advertisements to be provided to
users via a communication network
Abstract
According to some embodiments, systems and methods are provided
to select advertisements to be provided to users via a
communication network.
Inventors: |
Margiloff, William A.; (New
York, NY) ; Dallara, Keith M.; (New York, NY)
; Hansen, Christopher J.; (Brooklyn, NY) |
Correspondence
Address: |
BUCKLEY, MASCHOFF, TALWALKAR LLC
5 ELM STREET
NEW CANAAN
CT
06840
US
|
Family ID: |
32996362 |
Appl. No.: |
10/767242 |
Filed: |
January 29, 2004 |
Related U.S. Patent Documents
|
|
|
|
|
|
Application
Number |
Filing Date |
Patent Number |
|
|
60443511 |
Jan 29, 2003 |
|
|
|
60443513 |
Jan 29, 2003 |
|
|
|
60443512 |
Jan 29, 2003 |
|
|
|
Current U.S.
Class: |
705/14.54 ;
705/14.55; 705/14.71; 705/14.73 |
Current CPC
Class: |
G06Q 30/0257 20130101;
G06Q 30/0256 20130101; G06Q 30/0275 20130101; G06Q 30/02 20130101;
G06Q 30/0277 20130101 |
Class at
Publication: |
705/014 |
International
Class: |
G06F 017/60 |
Claims
What is claimed is:
1. A method, comprising: determining payment information associated
with a plurality of graphical advertisements to be electronically
provided to users via a communication network, the advertisements
being associated with a number of different advertisers;
determining user response information for each advertisement, the
user response information being associated with an action taken by
a user in response to an advertisement; and selecting at least one
of the advertisements based on the payment information and the user
response information.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein the selection of the
advertisement is not based on information received from a remote
user device.
3. The method of claim 1, wherein the communication network is the
Internet, the action by the user is clicking on the advertisement,
the payment information is a cost-per-click value, and the user
response information is a click-through-rate value.
4. The method of claim 3, wherein said selecting comprises:
selecting the advertisement based on the cost-per-click value
multiplied by the click-through-rate value.
5. The method of claim 1, the communication network is the
Internet, the action by the user is a purchase, the payment
information is a cost-per-action value, and the user response
information represents a user purchase frequency.
6. The method of claim 1, further comprising: displaying the
selected advertisement to a user.
7. The method of claim 1, further comprising: transmitting
information about the advertisement to a remote user device.
8. The method of claim 1, wherein the remote user device locally
determines when the advertisement will be displayed.
9. The method of claim 8, wherein the determination by the remote
user device is based on contextual information associated with
information being accessed by a user.
10. An apparatus, comprising: a processor; and a storage device in
communication with said processor and storing instructions adapted
to be executed by said processor to: determine payment information
associated with a plurality of graphical advertisements to be
electronically provided to users via a communication network, the
advertisements being associated with a number of different
advertisers; determine user response information for each
advertisement, the user response information being associated with
an action taken by a user in response to an advertisement; and
select at least one of the advertisements based on the payment
information and the user response information.
11. A medium storing instructions adapted to be executed by a
processor to perform a method, said method comprising: determining
payment information associated with a plurality of graphical
advertisements to be electronically provided to users via a
communication network, the advertisements being associated with a
number of different advertisers; determining user response
information for each advertisement, the user response information
being associated with an action taken by a user in response to an
advertisement; and selecting at least one of the advertisements
based on the payment information and the user response
information.
12. A method, comprising: storing a first bid amount associated
with a first graphical advertisement and contextual information;
storing a second bid amount associated with a second graphical
advertisement and the contextual information; determining
contextual information associated with remote information being
accessed by a user; selecting one of the first and second graphical
advertisements based on the first bid amount, the second bid
amount, and the contextual information; and arranging for the
selected graphical advertisement to be displayed to the user.
13. The method of claim 12, wherein the first bid amount is
received from a first advertiser and the second bid amount is
received from a second advertiser.
14. The method of claim 12, wherein said selecting is further based
on an advertisement rule.
15. The method of claim 12, wherein bid amount is associated with
at least one of: (i) a cost per advertisement and (ii) a cost per
user action.
16. The method of claim 12, wherein said determining is performed
locally at a user device.
17. The method of claim 16, wherein the contextual information
comprises at least one of: (i) a keyword, (ii) a search term, and
(iii) uniform resource locator information.
18. The method of claim 12, wherein said selecting is further based
on supplemental information associated with the user.
19. The method of claim 18, wherein the supplemental information is
associated with at least one of: (i) geographic information, (ii)
user device information, and (iii) other advertising information
that has been provided to the user.
20. The method of claim 12, wherein the graphically advertisement
is transmitted to a user device via a communication network and is
displayed to the user when the user device is not communicating via
the communication network.
21. A method, comprising: selecting an advertisement category based
on contextual information associated with remote information being
accessed by a user; providing an indication of the advertisement
category to the user, wherein the indication of the advertisement
category does not identify an advertiser; receiving from the user
an indication that the user is interested in the advertisement
category; and arranging, in response to the indication received
from the user, for advertising information associated with a
particular advertiser to be provided to the user.
22. The method of claim 21, wherein the contextual information
comprises at least one of: (i) a keyword, (ii) a search term, and
(iii) uniform resource locator information.
23. The method of claim 22, wherein a plurality of keywords are
associated with a single advertisement category.
24. The method of claim 21, further comprising: selecting the
particular advertiser from a plurality of potential
advertisers.
25. The method of claim 21, wherein said selecting is associated
with at least one of: (i) a bid amount, (ii) a payment amount,
(iii) a random process, (iv) a round robin process, and (v) user
information.
26. The method of claim 21, wherein the indication provided to the
user comprises at least one of: (i) a text indication, and (ii) a
graphical indication.
27. The method of claim 21, wherein the advertising information
comprises at least one of: (i) a text advertisement, and (ii) a
graphical advertisement.
28. An apparatus, comprising: a processor; and a storage device in
communication with said processor and storing instructions adapted
to be executed by the processor to: select an advertisement
category based on contextual information associated with remote
information being accessed by a user; provide an indication of the
advertisement category to the user, wherein the indication of the
advertisement category does not identify an advertiser; receive
from the user an indication that the user is interested in the
advertisement category; and arrange, in response to the indication
received from the user, for advertising information associated with
a particular advertiser to be provided to the user.
29. A medium storing instructions adapted to be executed by a
processor to perform a method, said method comprising: selecting an
advertisement category based on contextual information associated
with remote information being accessed by a user; providing an
indication of the advertisement category to the user, wherein the
indication of the advertisement category does not identify an
advertiser; receiving from the user an indication that the user is
interested in the advertisement category; and arranging, in
response to the indication received from the user, for advertising
information associated with a particular advertiser to be provided
to the user.
30. A method, comprising: receiving product information from a set
of potential advertisers associated with a product; determining
that contextual information is related to the product, the
contextual information being associated with remote information
being accessed by a user; selecting one of the potential
advertisers based on the product information and a rule associated
with the product; and arranging for advertising information
associated with the selected advertiser to be provided to the
user.
31. The method of claim 30, wherein the product information
comprises at least one of: (i) a product price, (ii) a product
quality, (iii) a product availability.
32. The method of claim 30, wherein the advertising information
comprises at least one of: (i) a text advertisement, and (ii) a
graphical advertisement.
33. The method of claim 30, further comprising: dynamically
constructing the advertising information in substantially real
time.
34. The method of claim 33, wherein said constructing comprises
aggregating advertising components.
35. The method of claim 30, wherein said receiving comprises at
least one of: (i) a periodic process, (ii) a batch process, and
(iii) a process performed in response to a determination of
contextual information.
Description
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] The present application claims priority under 35 U.S.C.
.sctn. 119(e) to (i) U.S. Provisional Patent Application No.
60/443,511 entitled "Systems and Methods for Providing an Improved
Toolbar," (ii) U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/443,513
entitled "Systems and Methods for Providing Locally Determined
Contextual Advertising Information via a Communications Network,"
and (iii) U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/443,512
entitled "Systems and Methods For Selecting Graphical
Advertisements To Be Provided To Users via a Communication
Network," all filed in the name of Margiloff et al. on Jan. 29,
2003. The present application is also related to (i) U.S. patent
application Ser. No. __/___,___ entitled "Systems and Methods for
Providing an Improved Toolbar" and (ii) U.S. patent application
Ser. No. __/___,___ entitled "Systems and Methods For Providing
Contextual Advertising Information via a Communication Network,"
filed concurrently herewith. The entire contents of these
applications are incorporated herein by reference.
FIELD
[0002] The present invention relates to advertising information. In
particular, the present invention relates to systems and methods
for selecting advertisements to be provided to users via a
communication network.
BACKGROUND
[0003] It is known that an advertising service can select graphical
advertisements to be displayed to a user (e.g., banner and pop-up
advertisements). It is also known that graphical advertisements (or
information associated with those advertisements) can be selected
and transmitted to a remote user device for later display. In some
cases, an advertising service may select a graphical advertisement
and dynamically incorporate the advertisement into a Web page that
is accessed by a user. In other cases, a local advertising
application can execute at the user's Personal Computer (PC) while
he or she accesses Web sites. The advertising application may, for
example, display a particular advertisement to the user based on a
Uniform Resource Locator (URL) address of a Web page that the user
is currently viewing.
[0004] In some cases, different advertisers are willing to pay
different amounts of money in exchange for the display of
advertisements to users. For example, a first advertiser might be
willing to pay three cents for every one thousand banner
advertisements that are displayed, referred to as the
cost-per-thousand value (CPM), while a second advertiser is only
willing pay two cents CPM. In this case, the advertising service
will typically want to select advertisements from the first
advertiser more often than it does from the second advertiser (to
increase revenue).
[0005] Some advertisers, however, may provide payment based on an
action performed by a user (instead of for merely displaying an
advertisement to the user). For example, an advertiser might pay
five cents for every user that clicks on a particular graphical
advertisement, referred to as the cost-per-click value (CPC).
[0006] As a result, the advertising service might not effectively
increase revenue by simply selecting advertisements that have high
CPC values (because if no users click on an advertisement the
advertising service will receive no payment at all--no matter how
high the CPC value). To avoid this, it is known that an operator
can manually review CPC values and click-through-rates (CTR) to
attempt to increase revenue. Such an approach, however, is time
consuming and a significant amount of revenue might still be lost
(e.g., due to operator error or delay), especially when there are a
large number of advertisers, advertisements, and/or users involved.
The approach may also be impractical when the advertisers,
advertisements, and/or payment amounts change frequently.
[0007] An adverising server may, in some cases, select one of a
number of different advertisements to be displayed to a user (e.g.,
an advertising service might select an advertisement based on a CPM
value). It might be the case, however, that the selected
advertisement should not be displayed to that particular user. For
example, an advertisement might not be appropriate when the store
being advertised does not currently have in stock the product the
user is interested in and/or when another store is selling the item
for a lower price.
[0008] Still another disadvantage of known advertising methods is
that different advertisements need to be created for different
advertisers. For example, a graphical banner advertisement created
for CIRCUIT CITY.RTM. that includes the store's name, a price of a
product at the store, and/or directions to the store cannot be used
if another electronics store wanted to advertise to users. The cost
and time required to create new advertisements may be
impractical--especially when there are a significant number of
frequently changing advertisers and/or the amounts being paid by
the advertisers are relatively small.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0009] FIG. 1 is a block diagram overview of a system according to
some embodiments of the present invention.
[0010] FIG. 2 illustrates a user display according to some
embodiments. of the present invention.
[0011] FIG. 3 is a flow chart of a method according to some
embodiments of the present invention.
[0012] FIG. 4 is a portion of an advertisement database according
to one embodiment of the present invention.
[0013] FIG. 5 is a portion of an advertisement database according
to another embodiment of the present invention.
[0014] FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an advertising controller
according to some embodiments of the present invention.
[0015] FIG. 7 illustrates a system according to another
embodiment.
[0016] FIG. 8 is a method according to another embodiment.
[0017] FIG. 9 illustrates a user display according to another
embodiment.
[0018] FIG. 10 is a system according to still another
embodiment.
[0019] FIG. 11 is a method according to some embodiments.
[0020] FIG. 12 is a block diagram of a system according to another
embodiment.
[0021] FIG. 13 is a flow chart of a method according to this
embodiment.
[0022] FIG. 14 is a portion of a bidding database according to this
embodiment.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0023] Some embodiments of the present invention are associated
with a "graphical advertisement." As used herein, the phrase
"graphical advertisement" may refer to, for example, graphical
information about a product or service, a coupon, or any other
commercial information that is provided to a user (and may also
include including text, animation, video, audio, and/or executable
information). Examples of graphical advertisements include banner
advertisements, interstitial advertisements (e.g., pop-up or
pop-under), and hyperstitial advertisements (e.g., "full-page"
advertisements).
[0024] System Overview
[0025] Turning now in detail to the drawings, FIG. 1 is a block
diagram of a system 100 according to some embodiments of the
present invention. In particular, a user device 110 executes a
browser application 120 (e.g., the INTERNET EXPLORER.RTM. browser
application available from MICROSOFT.RTM.) that accesses
information from a content server 130.
[0026] As used herein, devices (such as the user device 110 and the
content server 130) may communicate via a communication network
140, such as a Local Area Network (LAN), a Metropolitan Area
Network (MAN), a Wide Area Network (WAN), a proprietary network, a
Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), a Wireless Application
Protocol (WAP) network, a cable television network, or an Internet
Protocol (IP) network such as the Internet, an intranet or an
extranet. Note that the devices shown in FIG. 1 need not be in
constant communication. For example, the user device 110 may only
communicate with the content server 130 on an as-needed basis. In
some embodiments, for example, the user device 110 may be a PC that
intermittently utilizes a dial-up connection to the Internet via an
Internet Service Provider (ISP). In other embodiments the user
device 110 may be in constant and/or high-speed communication with
the content server 130 through the use of any known or available
connection device such as a cable or Digital Subscriber Line (DSL)
modem. According to some embodiments, the communication network 140
may be or include multiple networks of varying type, configuration,
size, and/or functionality.
[0027] Although a single user device 110 and a single content
server 130 are illustrated in FIG. 1, any number of these devices
may be included in the system 100. Similarly, any number of the
other devices described herein may be included in the system 100
according to embodiments of the present invention. A single content
server 130 may, for example, be in communication with multiple user
devices 110. In some embodiments, multiple content servers 130 may
provide various information such as advertisements and/or web pages
to one or more user device 110.
[0028] The user device 110 and the content server 130 may be any
devices capable of performing various functions described herein.
The user device 110 may be, for example: a PC, a portable computing
device such as a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), an interactive
television device, or any other appropriate storage and/or
communication device. The content server 130 may be, for example, a
Web server that provides web pages for the browser application
120.
[0029] According to some embodiments described herein, a graphical
advertisement is transmitted to the user device 110. For example,
the content server 130 might receive advertising information from
an advertising controller 160 and incorporate that information into
a Web page. FIG. 2 illustrates a user display 200 including a
graphical advertisement 210 according to some embodiments of the
present invention. According to another embodiment, the content
server 130 transmits to the browser application 110 a pointer
associated with the advertising information (e.g., a URL address).
The browser application 120 can then retrieve the advertising
information directly from the advertising controller 160 and
display it to the user.
[0030] According to other embodiments, information about an
advertisement is provided to the user device 110 well before it is
displayed to the user (e.g., the information might be downloaded to
the user device 110 on a nightly basis and displayed to the user
during the day--even when the user device 110 is not attached to
the communication network 140).
[0031] For example, the user device 110 might execute an
advertising application 150 (e.g., previously installed by the
user) that receives advertising information from the advertising
controller 160. This information might include advertisement
content and an associated advertisement rule--such as a rule
indicating that a particular advertisement should be displayed
whenever a user searches for the word "tires" via a search engine.
The advertisement content might represent information that can be
used by the advertising application 150 to access the advertisement
(e.g., by downloading a file from the advertising controller 160 or
from another advertiser device 180).
[0032] Advertising Controller Method
[0033] FIG. 3 is a flow chart of a method according to some
embodiments of the present invention. The flow charts in FIG. 3 and
the other figures described herein do not imply a fixed order to
the steps, and embodiments of the present invention can be
practiced in any order that is practicable. The method shown in
FIG. 3 may be performed, for example, by the advertising controller
160.
[0034] At 302, payment information is determined for a number of
different advertisements. For example, the advertising controller
160 might receive payment information from a number of advertiser
devices 180. Note that different advertisements might be associated
with different advertisers.
[0035] Consider graphical advertisements such as Web site banner
and "pop-up" advertisements. In this case, the payment information
might comprise a cost-per-click value (e.g., an advertiser might be
willing to pay two cents for each user who clicks on a banner
advertisement). As another example, the payment information might
comprise a cost-per-action value (e.g., an advertiser might be
willing to pay fifty cents for each user who registers with a Web
site in response to the graphical advertisement).
[0036] At 304, user response information is determined for each
advertisement. For example, the advertising controller 160 or an
advertiser device 180 might determine the user response information
based on actions taken by users in response to advertisements--such
as a click-through-rate value representing how often users clicked
on a pop-up advertisement. As another example, the user response
information might comprise a user purchase frequency representing
how often users purchased a product or service in response to a
banner advertisement.
[0037] At 306, at least one of the advertisements is selected based
on the payment information and the user response information. For
example, an advertisement might be selected based on its
cost-per-click value multiplied by its click-through-rate value.
Note that this selection might not be based, according to some
embodiments, on information received from a remote user device 110
(e.g., the advertisement might be selected without regard to
information received from the user via a Web site).
[0038] The selected advertisement may then be displayed to the user
(e.g., information about the advertisement may be transmitted to
his or her remote user device 110). According to some embodiments,
the remote user device 110 locally determines when the
advertisement will be displayed (e.g., via an advertising
application 150 that evaluates contextual information being
accessed by a user). According to some embodiments, the graphical
advertisement is displayed to the user via a toolbar (e.g., to help
the user recognize that the advertisement is not being provided by
the Web site he or she is currently viewing).
[0039] Advertisement Database Examples
[0040] Referring to FIG. 4, a table represents an advertisement
database 400 that may be stored at the advertising controller 160
according to an embodiment of the present invention. The table
includes entries identifying graphical advertisements that might be
provided to a user. The table also defines fields 402, 404, 406,
408, 410, 412 for each of the entries. The fields specify: an
advertiser identifier 402, an advertisement identifier 404,
advertisement content 406, a cost-per-click 408, a
click-through-rate 410, and ranking information 412. The
information in the advertisement database 400 may be created and
updated, for example, based on information received from a content
server 130, an advertiser device 180, and/or user devices 110
(e.g., on a nightly basis).
[0041] The advertiser identifier 402 may be, for example, an
alphanumeric code associated with an advertiser who wants to
provide graphical advertisements to users. The advertisement
identifier 404 may be, for example, an alphanumeric code associated
with a graphical advertisement that might be displayed to a user.
The advertisement content 406 might comprise, for example, a
pointer indicating where advertisement information can be retrieved
from or the information itself (perhaps including text, animation,
video, audio, and/or executable information).
[0042] The cost-per-click 408 is a value representing an amount of
money the advertiser is willing to pay each time a user clicks on
the advertisement. For example, the advertiser associated with
"A101" will pay five, cents each time a user clicks on
advertisement "A101-01." The click-through-rate 410 is a value
representing how often users click on the advertisement (e.g.,
during the lifetime of the advertisement or during a pre-determined
period, such as the last three days). For example, five out of
every one hundred users click on advertisement "A101-01." According
to some embodiments, a default click-through-rate value is provided
when no actual data is available (e.g., for a newly created
advertisement).
[0043] The ranking information 412 is based on the cost-per-click
408 and the click-through-rate 410 and may be used by the
advertising controller 160 to select which advertisement(s) will be
provided to users. As illustrated in FIG. 4, the ranking
information 412 may represent the cost-per-click 408 multiplied by
the actual click-through-rate 410. As a result, a first
advertisement with a higher cost-per-click 408 as compared to a
second advertisement may still have lower ranking information 412.
For example, advertisement "A102-02" (with a cost-per-click 408 of
fifteen cents) is ranked fourth while advertisement "A101-01" (with
a cost-per-per-click 408 of five cents) is ranked second. This is
because the click-through-rate 410 associated with advertisement
"A101-01" is so much higher as compared to advertisement "A102-02."
In this way, the revenue collected by the advertising controller
160 may be improved.
[0044] Referring now to FIG. 5, a table represents an advertisement
database 500 that might be stored at the advertising controller 160
according to another embodiment of the present invention. Again,
the table includes entries identifying graphical advertisements
that might be provided to a user. The table also defines fields
502, 504, 506, 508, 510, 512 for each of the entries. The fields
specify: an advertiser identifier 502, an advertisement identifier
504, advertisement content 506, a cost-per-action 508, a user
action frequency 510, and ranking information 512. The information
in the advertisement database 500 may be created and updated, for
example, based on information received from a content server 130,
an advertiser device 180, and/or user devices 110.
[0045] The cost-per-action 508 is a value representing an amount of
money the advertiser is willing to pay each time a user performs
some action in response to a graphical advertisement. By way of
example, the action performed by the user might comprise: (i)
clicking on the advertisement, (ii) registering with a Web site or
service, (iii) purchasing a product or service, or (iv) subscribing
to a service. For example, the advertiser "A101" will pay seventy
five cents each time a user registers with an associated Web site.
The user action frequency 510 is a value representing how often
users perform the action. For example, two out of every one
thousand users will (on average) subscribe to a newsletter in
response to advertisement "A102-01."
[0046] The ranking information 512 is based on the cost-per-action
508 and the user action frequency 510 and may be used by the
advertising controller 160 to select which advertisement(s) will be
provided to users. As illustrated in FIG. 5, the ranking
information 512 may represent the cost-per-action 508 multiplied by
the user action frequency 510. As a result, an advertisement with a
higher cost-per-action 508 could have a rank worse than another
advertisement with a lower cost-per-action 508.
[0047] Note that the ranking information 512 does not need to be a
simply numerical ranking order. For example, as illustrated in FIG.
5, different advertisements might be placed into different
categories (e.g., and advertisements may be selected from different
categories at different frequencies). As another approach, the
ranking information 512 might represent a weighing factor used in a
random advertisement selection process.
[0048] Also note that the ranking information 512 may represent an
effective CPM for the advertisement. In this way, an advertising
controller 160 could select from among advertisements that are
associated with CPM values, cost-per-click values, and/or
cost-per-action values.
[0049] Advertising Controller
[0050] FIG. 6 illustrates an advertising controller 600 that is
descriptive of the device shown in FIG. 1 according to an
embodiment of the present invention. The advertising controller 600
comprises a processor 610, such as one or more INTEL.RTM.
Pentium.RTM. processors, coupled to a communication device 620
configured to communicate via a communication network (not shown in
FIG. 6). The communication device 620 may be used to communicate,
for example, with one or more user devices 110, content servers
130, and/or advertiser devices 180. The user device 600 further
includes an input device 640 (e.g., a mouser and/or keyboard) and
an output device 650 (e.g., a computer monitor).
[0051] The processor 610 communicates with a storage device 630.
The storage device 630 may comprise any appropriate information
storage device, including combinations of magnetic storage devices
(e.g., a hard disk drive), optical storage devices, and/or
semiconductor memory devices such as Random Access Memory (RAM)
devices and Read Only Memory (ROM) devices.
[0052] The storage device 630 stores a program 615 for controlling
the processor 610. The processor 610 performs instructions of the
program 615, and thereby operates in accordance with any of the
embodiments described herein. For example, the processor 610 may
select graphical advertisements to be displayed to a user based on
information stored in an advertisement database 660.
[0053] The program 615 may be stored in a compressed, uncompiled
and/or encrypted format. The program 615 may furthermore include
other program elements, such as an operating system, a database
management system, and/or device drivers used by the processor 610
to interface with peripheral devices.
[0054] As used herein, information may be "received" by or
"transmitted" to, for example: (i) the advertising controller 600
from another device; or (ii) a software application or module
within the advertising controller 600 from another software
application, module, or any other source.
[0055] Indication of an Advertisement Category
[0056] FIG. 7 illustrates a system 700 according to another
embodiment. As before, a user device 710 receives information from
an advertising controller 730 via a communication network 720
(e.g., while accessing remote web sites). Note that the devices
and/or methods of exchanging information may be performed in
accordance with other embodiments described herein or in any other
way.
[0057] The advertising controller 730 receives information from a
advertisement database 732. In particular, the advertisement
database 732 stores information associated with a number of product
"categories." For example, the advertisement database 732 may store
information about an "electronics" product category, including a
keyword associated with that category (e.g., "electronics") as well
as a number of different advertisements associated with that
category (e.g., advertisements 1 through 3). Similarly, the
advertisement database 732 may store information about an
"automotive" product category, including several different keywords
associated with that category (e.g., "cars," "tires," and
"automobiles") as well as a number of different advertisements
associated with that category (e.g., advertisements 4 through
6).
[0058] FIG. 8 is a method according to this embodiment. At 802, an
advertisement category is selected based on contextual information
(e.g., associated with remote information being accessed by a
user). For example, a "hotel" or "travel" advertisement category
might be selected when a user types "hotels" into a search bar.
Similarly, the contextual information might be related to a keyword
that appears on a web page, a URL, audio information, and/or
graphical information (e.g., when a picture of an automobile is
displayed to a user).
[0059] At 804, an indication of the advertisement category is
provided to the user (e.g., a text, graphical, and/or audio
indication). According to this embodiment, the indication of the
advertisement category does not identify an advertiser. For
example, a banner advertisement that simply says "click here for a
great travel offer" might be displayed to the user. Note that an
advertisement category might be based on product information,
retailer information, and/or user information.
[0060] At 806, an indication may be received from the user. If no
indication is received from the user, no advertisement information
is displayed at 808. If an indication of interest is received from
the user (e.g., he or she clicks on the banner advertisement),
advertisement information associated with that advertisement
category is selected at 812. The selection may be based on, for
example, a bid amount (e.g., a retailer who provides a relatively
high bid to an advertising service might be selected), a payment
amount, a random process, a round robin process, and/or user
information.
[0061] It is then arranged for advertising information associated
with a particular advertiser to be provided to the user at 812. For
example, the user may be taken to an automotive web site. Note that
the advertising information might include text, audio, and/or
graphical information.
[0062] FIG. 9 illustrates a user display 900 according to another
embodiment. In this case, the user has entered "tires" into a
search bar. As a result, an icon appears stating "Click Here for an
Automotive Offer!" If the user activates the icon (as illustrated
by a dashed arrow in FIG. 9), an advertisement from a selected
automotive retailer is automatically displayed to the user (e.g.,
he or she does not need perform any other action).
[0063] Note that that the original icon does not indicate a
particular product or advertiser. In this way, an advertising
service might be able to provide advertising information from a
relative large number of frequently changing retailers without
needing to continually create new icons.
[0064] Selecting a Potential Advertiser Based on Product
Information
[0065] FIG. 10 is a system 1000 according to still another
embodiment. As before, a user device 1010 receives information from
an advertising controller 1030 via a communication network 1020
(e.g., while accessing remote web sites). Note that the devices
and/or methods of exchanging information may be performed in
accordance with other embodiments described herein or in any other
way.
[0066] The advertising controller 1030 receives product and/or
retailer information form a number of different sources. For
example, the advertising controller 1030 may receive information
indicating the price a user would have to pay in order to download
a particular song from a number of different online music
retailers.
[0067] FIG. 11 is a method according to this embodiment. At 1102,
product information is received from a set of potential advertisers
associated with a product. The product information might include,
for example, a product price, a product quality (e.g., a restaurant
rating), and/or a product availability (e.g., indicating whether a
particular computer model is currently in stock). Note that the
product information may be received via a periodic process (e.g.,
once per day), a batch process, and/or a process performed in
response to a determination of contextual information.
[0068] At 1104, it is determined that contextual information is
related to the product, the contextual information being associated
with remote information being accessed by a user. For example, when
a user accesses a web page that includes the key phrase "wireless
service" it might be determined that the context of the web page is
associated with a VERIZON.RTM. subscription plan. Similarly, the
contextual information might be related to a search term, a URL,
audio information, and/or graphical information.
[0069] At 1106, one of the potential advertisers is selected based
on the product information and a rule associated with the product.
For example, an advertising controller 1030 might always select the
potential advertiser that sells a product at the lowest price.
[0070] According to some embodiments, advertising information is
then dynamically constructing in substantially real time. For
example, advertising components, including an indication that this
advertiser is selling the item at the lowest price as of a
particular date, might be aggregated to create a graphical
advertisement. This may be performed in response the selection at
1106 or at any other time.
[0071] It is then arranged for advertising information (e.g., a
text or graphical advertisement that was created based on the
product information) associated with the selected advertiser to be
provided to the user at 1108. Note that according to some
embodiments, retailer information is used instead of, or addition
to, the product information (e.g., the retailer information might
indicate that the retailer has the average lowest price for a
particular type of product).
[0072] Bidding Engine
[0073] FIG. 12 is a block diagram of a system 1200 according to
another embodiment. As before, a user device 1210 may receive
information from an advertisement controller 1230 via a
communication network 1220. Note that the devices and/or methods of
exchanging information may be performed in accordance with other
embodiments described herein or in any other way.
[0074] According to this embodiment, the advertising controller
1230 further includes a bid engine that receives bid amounts from a
number of different advertisers. For example, a first advertiser
might indicate that it is willing to pay $0.03 for each
advertisement that is displayed to a user. According to some
embodiments, the advertiser also provides graphical advertisement
information to the advertising controller 1230 (e.g., as an image
file or a pointer to a web page). The bid amounts may be further
associated with contextual information. For example, a bid amount
might indicate that the advertiser is willing to pay $0.03 when an
advertisement is displayed to a user who has entered the word
"hotels" into a search engine. Note that multiple keywords might be
associated with a bid.
[0075] FIG. 13 is a flow chart of a method that might be performed
by the advertising controller 1230 according to this embodiment. At
1302, a first bid amount is stored associated with a first
graphical advertisement and contextual information. Similarly, a
second bid amount is stored associated with a second graphical
advertisement and the contextual information at 1304. The bid
amounts may be, for example, received from different advertisers
and/or different advertiser devices (e.g., via an advertising
service Web site). Note that the bid amounts might be associated
with a cost per advertisement displayed to a user and/or a cost per
user action (e.g., a CPC amount).
[0076] At 1306, contextual information is determined associated
with remote information being accessed by a user. For example, an
application running locally at a user device might determine the
contextual information based on a keyword, a search term, a URL,
and/or a mouse position.
[0077] One of the first and second graphical advertisements are
then selected at 1308 based on the first bid amount, the second bid
amount, and the contextual information. For example, when a user
accesses a Web page that includes an image having the word "auto"
in the image file name, an advertising controller might select the
advertisement that (i) is associated with the keyword "auto" and
(ii) has the highest bid amount.
[0078] The selection performed at 1308 may be further based on an
advertisement rule. For example, in some cases an advertisement
with a lower bid amount might be selected (e.g., an advertisement
with a higher bid amount might be more like likely, but not
guaranteed, to be selected). The selection might also be based,
according to some embodiments, on supplemental information
associated with the user. For example, the supplemental information
might be associated with geographic information, user device
information, and/or other advertisements that have been displayed
to the user.
[0079] At 1310, it is arranged for the selected graphical
advertisement to be displayed to the user. For example, a pop-up
advertisement might be displayed on the user's computer monitor. In
some cases, the graphical advertisement may be provided to the user
in substantially real time. In other cases, the graphical
advertisement may be provided to a user device via a communication
network and then be displayed to the user when the user device is
not communicating via the communication network.
[0080] Referring to FIG. 14, a table represents an advertisement
database 1400 that may be stored at the advertising controller 1230
according to this embodiment. The table includes entries
identifying graphical advertisements that might be provided to a
user. The table also defines fields 1402, 1404, 1406, 1408, 1410,
1412 for each of the entries. The fields specify: an advertiser
identifier 1402, an advertisement identifier 1404, advertisement
content 1406, one or more keywords 1408, a bid 1410, and ranking
information 1412. The information in the advertisement database
1400 may be created and updated, for example, based on information
received from advertisers.
[0081] The advertiser identifier 1402 may be, for example, an
alphanumeric code associated with an advertiser who wants to
provide graphical advertisements to users. The advertisement
identifier 1404 may be, for example, an alphanumeric code
associated with a graphical advertisement that might be displayed
to a user. The advertisement content 1406 might comprise, for
example, a pointer indicating where advertisement information can
be retrieved from or the graphical information itself.
[0082] The bid amount 1410 represents an amount the advertiser is
willing to pay to have the advertisement displayed to a user.
According to other embodiments, the bid amount 1410 is a cost per
user action, such as a CPC value representing an amount of money
the advertiser is willing to pay each time a user clicks on the
advertisement.
[0083] The ranking information 1412 is based on the bid amount
1410. For example, the first four entries in the database 1400 are
associated with the keyword "tires." In this case, advertisement
A101 is ranked first because it is associated with the highest bid
amount 1410. As a result, that advertisement might be selected and
displayed to a user who enters the word "tires" into a search
engine. According to some embodiments, advertisers can view their
current ranking information 1412. Moreover, an advertiser might be
able view ranking information 1412 and/or bid amounts 1410
associated with other advertisers (e.g., via an advertising service
Web site).
[0084] The present invention has been described in terms of several
embodiments solely for the purpose of illustration. Persons skilled
in the art will recognize from this description that the invention
is not limited to the embodiments described.
* * * * *